Cleaning implements such as sponges, mesh balls, applicators, and similar flexible compressible porous and permeable materials commonly are used to clean the skin of people and animals, as well as to clean inanimate objects. While it is usually is quite easy to apply soap to these cleaning implements, and to apply them in a scrubbing manner by means of the user's hands, it very often is not so easy to get them into positions where they can be placed into contact with the surface to be cleaned, such the back of a bather or the interior of a bottle or jar. In addition, some cleaning solutions are very hot, or are caustic or the like, in which case the user needs to protect his or her hands. While this may be done with gloves, the problem of reaching inaccessible places remains.
Further, the effectiveness of using a cleaning implement to clean any object depends on the level of control the user has over the interaction between the surfaces of the cleaning implement and the surfaces the object being cleaned. For example, if the cleaning implement is allowed to slide, or rotate, relative to the surface being cleaned in ways not controllable to the user, then the interactive rubbing action, for example, of the implement relative to the surface may be less than optimal.
Thus, what is needed is a means for holding and manipulating such cleaning implements that addresses the aforementioned problems. Such a device would assist a user in cleaning hard-to-reach locations while allowing the cleaning implements to readily be attached and detached, and while providing a degree of translational and rotational stability between the cleaning implement and the holder.
This application discloses a holder form holding cleaning implements that is economical to produce, of simple construction and capable of mass production, but also capable of providing a holder of cleaning implements that is capable of extending a users reach and that holds the cleaning implements in a stable fashion.
In particular, this application discloses a device for holding and manipulating compressible cleaning implements is disclosed wherein the cleaning implements may be made from a compressible material and may have a compressible portion. The device may include a handle. A blade may be attached to the handle. An outer blade edge may surround the blade. An opening through the blade may be defined by an inner blade edge. A channel may pass through the blade and may extend from the inner blade edge to the outer blade edge, and may be defined by a first channel edge and a second channel edge. The compressible portion of the cleaning implement may be passed through the channel into the opening and may be held in the opening by engagement with the inner blade edge. Each of the first and second channel edges may respectively define first and second circumferentially directed points configured to poke into the compressible material